German conservatives are calling for a tougher course on suspected Islamists after the deadly Christopher Street Day attack in Berlin. The presumed attacker was released from detention this May. DW has the latest.
What you need to know
Senior German politicians are calling for strict penalties and intelligence reform following the Berlin attack
The suspected Berlin Pride attacker Abdul B. was a known Islamist radical
Number of unaccompanied minors entering Germany nearly halved last year, German authorities say
Plastinator Gunther von Hagens, creator of "Body Worlds" anatomy exhibits, dies at age 81
Here is a roundup of some of the top headlines from and about Germany on Monday, July 27, 2026.
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German weather service warns of incoming high temperatures, particularly in west and south
Germany's DWD national weather service is warning of a sharp rise in temperatures as this week progresses.
The south and west is likely to be hit hardest, especially in the short term with quite a lot of cloud coverage still forecast futher north on Tuesday.
Temperatures in the southwest could peak at up to 33 degrees Celsius (91.4 Fahrenheit) on Tuesday, as the hot weather that's caused major wildfires in Spain and France heads east.
By Wednesday and Thursday, sunshine and hotter weather will have reached almost all of the country.
On Thursday, even up on the north coast highs around 31 Celsius are forecast, while temperatures could peak around 39 Celsius in the Upper Rhine region and Bavaria.
The hot weather is however forecast to give way to thunderstorms and lower temperatures relatively quickly, unlike the prolonged and more pronounced heat wave earlier in the summer . However, much of the country is already parched, with water restrictions in place and crops and grassland struggling after several weeks of drier and warmer weather than a more typical summer.
German municipalities impose water restrictions
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Whale sighted in Wismar Bay once more, soon after 'Timmy' drama
The state Environment Ministry in Mecklenburg Western-Pomerania has reported another whale sighting in Wismar Bay in northern Germany.
This comes a few months after the stranding of a humpback whale nicknamed "Timmy" at the same site, which ended with a contentious attempted rescue in May and then news of the creature's death at sea soon after.
The whale was first sighted at about 9 a.m. near the western harbor of the Wismar Bay and repeatedly observed thereafeter, the ministry said.
"Based on current observations the whale appears healthy. It is regularly diving and resurfacing," the ministry wrote in a press release.
"It's not yet possible to conclusively say what type of whale it is. Its size can also only be estimated, based on first observations the whale is roughly 8 meters (roughly 26 feet) long."
If that size estimate is accurate, the whale would be quite considerably smaller than "Timmy," a young humpback that was more than 12 meters long.
There are shallows in most directions inside the bay, with only a complex route back to open waters available — first headed west-north-west out of the bay, and then turning northeast toward the Baltic Sea.
The ministry said that a police boat was monitoring the situation, trying to prevent any danger for ships or recreational boats. It asked all sailing and water sports enthusiasts to keep well clear and said it would issue more information as soon as it was available.
Whale 'Timmy' found dead near Danish island
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Germany's Merz mulls stripping of citizenship for terrorists
Following the news that the Berlin attacker was a known religious extremist, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said law enforcement should do everything in its power to "limit the freedom of movement of such potential offenders as much as possible."
Merz told reporters that he had already asked Germany's Interior Minister, Alexander Dobrindt, to look into the issue.
Police named 21-year-old Abdul B. as the driver of the van that rammed into revelers during a Berlin Pride celebration this Saturday. The man was born in Berlin and — despite his Lebanese roots — only had German citizenship.
Commenting on the case, Merz said that stripping someone of citizenship was not possible if they only had one, like in this case. However, he said that removing the German citizenship of dual nationals was possible even without changing Germany's Basic Law, which effectively operates as the country constitution.
He also said that many people who had been ordered to leave Germany should be indeed pushed into leaving as soon as possible, as the group includes many potentially dangerous individuals.
Germany's Central Council of Muslims condemns the Berlin attack
The umbrella association of Muslim communities in Germany said there was no justification for violence against innocent people after an apparent Islamist attack on the Berlin Pride march on Saturday.
"No one should be subjected to violence on the grounds of their sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, origin or other personal characteristics," the Central Council of Muslims in Germany (ZMD) said in a statement.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims, their families and all those who had to witness this terrible act."
The group also urged a "clear stance against all forms of hatred," warning of extremist ideologies that are "dividing our society and seeking to pit people against one another."
Europe's deadliest terror attacks: Revisiting a decade on
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The suspected attacker, Abdul B., is a German national of Lebanese descent. Despite being born into a Shiite family, he sought to join the Sunni "Islamic State" militia in Syria and spent three months in a Lebanese jail before returning to Germany.
The suspect's father told the German Spiegel magazine that the family was "not extremely religious."
Berlin Pride organizers warn against hatred of Muslims
Germany's CSD Association, the organizers of the Berlin Pride event that was cut short by a terror attack on Saturday, pledged not to be suppressed by violence.
The organization said that both "right-wing and religious ideologies aim to oppress queer people."
"Behind such violence lies an attempt to divide our society and pit people against one another,” they said in a statement. "We will not allow that to happen."
Germany calls deadly Pride attack 'Islamic terror'
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The group said they condemned "Islamist terrorism clearly and unequivocally," but would oppose attempts to use this attack to incite hate against Muslims.
"Love is stronger than hate," the CSD Association said.
WATCH: What does the Berlin Pride attack mean for city's identity?
DW asked Alfonso Pantisano, Queer Commissioner of the Berlin State Government for the acceptance of sexual and gender diversity, how the LGBTQ+ community was feeling in the wake of the attack.
What does the Berlin Pride attack mean for city's identity?
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German Justice Ministry considering reform of juvenile law
As pressure grows on Germany's judiciary and law enforcement following the attack in Berlin, the country's Justice Ministry announced it was planning a study looking into reforming juvenile law.
Under current law, Germany has special legal considerations for persons younger than 21. For the suspects between 18 and 20 years of age, the court has the power to decide whether they should be trialed as adults.
The suspected attacker in Berlin, Abdul B., was reportedly given a suspended sentence and released from detention by a juvenile court this May.
On Monday, the Justice Ministry announced that it would commission a study to examine the need for reform, with preliminary results expected by the end of next year.
A ministry spokesperson noted that the decision was not motivated by Saturday's "shocking isolated incident." Rather, the ministry is responding to "a troubling trend in crimes committed by children and adolescents."
Woman killed in Berlin attack was from Poland, officials say
The person who lost her life in the Berlin attack on Saturday was from Poland , Berlin's Mayor Kai Wegner said on Monday.
Wegner made the comments while addressing a Polish diplomat at the opening of an exhibition on the 1944 Warsaw Uprising in the Berlin City Hall.
"I am deeply moved by what happened on Saturday, and my thoughts are with you and, above all, with the daughter and the family of the murdered woman," the Berlin mayor said, adding that the attack was motivated by "hatred."
Separately, the Polish Foreign Ministry confirmed that the woman killed in Berlin was Polish.
The attack also left 29 people injured.
Merz: Still too early for political consequences
Addressing reporters in Berlin, Chancellor Friedrich Merz said it was still too early to clarify political consequences of the Berlin van ramming.
At the same time, Merz said that his government will look into the attack, which police say was committed by a Berlin-born man who was a known Islamist extremist.
"Most of all, we will have to answer the question: How is it at all possible that a man with this classification here in Berlin could have approached the Christopher Street Day undisturbed and commit this attack?"
German Chancellor Merz pledges to 'protect and defend' freedom
Commenting on the Berlin attack this Saturday, Germany's Chancellor Friedrich Merz said the victims were celebrating "openness, diversity, and freedom" and "were attacked by an Islamist" over those values.
"We will do everything to protect and defend this freedom, openness and liberality," Merz told reporters at a Berlin press conference.
"That is a mission of a government, but also of the society," he added.
What else has happened in Germany today?
We are taking a brief pause from our coverage of the Saturday attack to bring you more stories making headlines in Germany.
Number of unaccompanied minors entering Germany drops by nearly half
A new report indicates a sharp reduction in the number of unaccompanied children and minors crossing Germany's borders.
According to the Federal Statistics Office, the number of minors taken into care after entering Germany dropped from 30.800 to 16.500 in a single year.
This change is also reflected in the overall number of children taken into state care in Germany — the authorities placed around 56,900 children into a foster family or a state facility last year, which is a drop of around 18% compared to 2024. The 2024 numbers had already shown a 7% reduction.
Merz's CDU names new general secretary — report
In the latest step of Chancellor Friedrich Merz's reshuffle, lawmaker Franziska Hoppermann is set to become general secretary of Germany's Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
On Monday, sources told dpa that Merz had proposed Hoppermann, the conservative party's treasurer, at a closed-door meeting in Berlin. She will replace Carsten Linnemann, who is set to take over the Health Ministry.
Hoppermann's appointment is the latest change within Merz's conservative-led government , sparked by the resignation of parliamentary group leader Jens Spahn .
Plastinator Gunther von Hagens dies at age 81
Gunther von Hagens, the physician who invented plastination, has died. On Monday, his family and the Institute for Plastination in Heidelberg announced his passing on Friday at the age of 81.
In the 1970s, von Hagens developed a preservation technique in Heidelberg for turning cadavers into anatomical specimens, which became known worldwide through his "Body Worlds" exhibitions.
He had been suffering from Parkinson's disease for many years.
Terrorists still 'relentless' in spreading propaganda
Talking to DW, terrorism expert Hans-Jakob Schindler said the suspected attacker, Abdul B., was "very close, and potentially, even a member of the 'Islamic State' which means that we have the hardest, most extremist misinterpretation of Islam possible in the world."
"All extremist milieus always have a call to action. Either by peaceful means, if we talk about what is called in Germany 'legalistic Islamism' i.e. change and destroy the political system and the free, democratic society by non-violent means — or in the case of terrorist Islamism, by violent means," he said.
"Now, the queer, LGBTQ+ community is a symbol for these guys for a free, open and Western society, and therefore very very high on the list of symbolic targets to attack."
Schindler, who serves as a senior director of the international Counter Extremism Project NGO, warned that the terrorists remained "relentless."
"There are far more terror attacks that get prevented in Germany than the ones that actually happen. But the other side is relentless, every day they are trying to motivate individuals to attack," Schindler told DW.
He pointed to social media platforms, claiming that the networks were failing to cooperate with security forces and "remove the harmful content which leads people to radicalize."
WATCH: Berlin Pride attack — what we know now
Watch the DW livestream below for updates on Saturday's van attack at the Berlin Pride parade, which left one person dead and dozens others injured.
German conservatives urge clampdown on potential terrorists in wake of Berlin ramming
Senior politicians from the CDU/CSU conservative block are calling for harsher penalties, intelligence sharing and other reforms to deal with violent extremists following the latest attack in Berlin.
Police have identified the attacker as Abdul B., a German national with Lebanese roots, who had spent months in detention after trying to join the "Islamic State" in Syria.
Marc Henrichmann, chairman of the Bundestag's Intelligence Oversight Committee, described the van ramming as a "declaration of war against our free democracy" that should not be treated "with kid gloves." He called for seamless data sharing between different intelligence agencies, as well as "appropriate data retention" to track suspected terrorists and identify their allies.
Let us not be intimidated by these crimes: Chancellor Merz
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Meanwhile, Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann decried the fact that the suspected Berlin attacker received only a suspended sentence after returning to Germany. Herrmann described it as a "disaster" and said the judges passing the verdict needed to be aware of "the responsibility they have, including for human lives."
The interior minister of Saxony-Anhalt, Sven Schulze, also urged a tougher course on extremism, saying that people should not be treated mildly just because they are German nationals.
"We must not allow people who do not accept our culture to live here," he told the Deutschlandfunk radio network.
What do we know about the suspected attacker?
Authorities named the attacker as 21-year-old Abdul B., born in Berlin. The German national was known to law enforcement for being radicalized. Last year, he traveled to Lebanon in a failed attempt to join the "Islamic State" militia , was arrested and spent three months in a Lebanese prison before he was allowed to return to Germany.
Upon flying back to Berlin in November 2025, he was detained by German authorities on charges including preparing a serious violent act against the state. After spending months in pre-trial detention, a juvenile court sentenced him to a year and ten months in May. However, his sentence was suspended and he was released.
The suspect was expected to take part in a de-radicalization course.
The prosecutors then appealed the court's decision, demanding a stricter punishment.
German police shoot dead Berlin Pride attack suspect
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On Saturday, Abdul B. drove a van through the crowd celebrating Christopher Street Day in Berlin and fled the scene. He was eventually tracked down and shot by German police.